Ted Cruz avoids personal criticism of Wendy Davis as he addresses anti-abortion group

1/1

Sonya Hebert-Schwartz/Staff Photographer

U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz, at the National Right to Life convention on Friday, said, "When Austin Democrats stood together in their filibuster, they were filibustering the ability to carry out late-term abortions, to protect the ability to take more lives."

GRAPEVINE — U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz said Friday that state Sen. Wendy Davis’ filibuster against abortion legislation was not morally equivalent to the filibuster he and Sen. Rand Paul used to protest the Obama administration’s domestic drone policy.

“We were filibustering to protect the sanctity of life from arbitrary government destruction,” Cruz told a national anti-abortion group. “When Austin Democrats stood together in their filibuster, they were filibustering the ability to carry out late-term abortions, to protect the ability to take more lives.”

In his speech to the National Right to Life convention, Cruz took care to avoid personal criticism of Davis, the Fort Worth Democrat whose political star has soared this week after a marathon session that helped derail legislation to ban abortions after 20 weeks.

On Thursday, Gov. Rick Perry told the group Davis hadn’t learned from her own example “that every life must be given a chance to realize its full potential and that every life matters.” Davis was born to a single mother and was, herself, a teenage mother living in poor circumstances before she went on to Harvard Law School and the Senate.

Critics pounced on Perry’s remarks as condescending. Addressing the same group Friday, Cruz, a Republican elected last year, took a decidedly different tack.

“I don’t know Ms. Davis,” Cruz told reporters. “I assume she’s standing for the principles she believes in. I respect anyone who stands and fights for their principles. But at the end of the day, the positions she’s advocating are inconsistent with the views of a majority of Texans.”

The national gathering of abortion opponents came the same week hundreds of abortion rights protesters in Austin disrupted the Senate when GOP leaders sought to break Davis’ filibuster on the final night of the special legislative session. The Republican majority eventually approved the bill, but it was past the midnight deadline.

Perry has called lawmakers back for another special session on Monday to consider the issue again.

“We saw people using tactics to try and disrupt the legislative process and to stop elected representatives from voting their principles and from voting for a policy that is supported by a large majority of Texans,” Cruz said. “I thought it was unfortunate that a handful of protesters felt they had a right to shut down the legislative process.”

Davis told MSNBC that the governor’s comment “demeans the office that he holds.”

Perry and Lt. Gov David Dewhurst “decided this intrusion on women’s personal individual decision-making should be used as a political pawn for their own political aspirations,” she said.

Perry has not announced whether he’ll run for re-election next year but is considering another bid for president in 2016. Dewhurst, the presiding officer in the Senate, is seeking re-election.

Follow Wayne Slater on Twitter at @wayneslater.

UPDATE: Straus says Perry crossed line

Texas House Speaker Joe Straus said Friday that Gov. Rick Perry’s decision to personalize the abortion fracas by attacking Sen. Wendy Davis was distasteful and harmful.

“Disagreements over policy are important and they’re healthy, but when he crosses the line into the personal, then he damages himself and he damages the Republican Party,” Straus told the Texas Tribune.

Democrats have pilloried the governor for his comments, and most Republicans have demurred, though many have privately expressed concern that Perry is feeding the Democratic narrative of a GOP “war on women.”

Straus, of San Antonio, was the first Texas Republican leader to rebuke Perry for the remarks.

To post a comment, log into your chosen social network and then add your comment below. Your comments are subject to our Terms of Service and the privacy policy and terms of service of your social network. If you do not want to comment with a social network, please consider writing a letter to the editor.